


blight

by orphan_account



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Lovely Bones AU, M/M
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2015-07-08
Updated: 2015-08-17
Packaged: 2018-04-08 07:19:15
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death, Rape/Non-Con, Underage
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,160
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4295646
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jean Kirschstein, aged 15, died in the winter of 1976. He watched from heaven, eyes lingering on his family, his friends, his could-have-been boyfriend, murderer, their lives without him.</p><p>And this enabled him to hold the world in the palm of his hand.</p><p> </p><p>  <i>The Lovely Bones AU</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> First chapter, basically just flashback of Jean's murder, slight introduction to his brothers. Pairings implied will be used in the future, just not in this chapter.

Jean Kirschstein, aged 15, died in the winter of 1976. To be exact, the date was the 15th of December. It was cold outside, he remembered, and the morning air had been chilled, causing his breath to show and his nose to run as he rushed home in a hurry.

It was in small details of the fateful morning that he began to remember and weakly embrace it, to look at the world that had just recently began to grow around his absence and hold it in the palm of his hand.

***

Jean began to notice that his older brothers were drifting even farther away from him, if it were possible.

They never came inside of his room anymore, something they used to do often when he first went missing, just to trace their trembling fingers across the unmade sheets of his bed, to press their noses against the clothes that still faintly smelled of him, to give themselves tiny pieces of Jean, who was now untouchable, otherworldly, almost nonexistent in this life. Intangible save for parts of him that really were not.

They neglected to claim Jean as their own when meeting people who weren't aware, hating to see the look in people's eyes when they used their infamous last name in polite introductions. They imagined what others saw in their heads when their baby brother came to mind; blood, knives, sticky sacks that carefully cradled a lifeless body inside, mutilated beyond recognition. Mangled images of him painted in gore that rooted people to the spot and tied his siblings in like a rope.

The more he watched, the more he began to grasp that they hated being brothers not of Jean Kirschstein, but of the dead boy. He tried to understand. He tried to be patient and understand that they weren’t trying to let him go, to shun him, only disassociate themselves with the title he unintentionally offered them.

The more he saw, the more he wondered if they hated him for it.

***

Daniel and Jason Kirschstein; older brothers of Jean Kirschstein, hardworking students in school, one graduating during the summer of 1976, the other a junior. Both could say they were family to a young boy who was murdered at the age of 15. Not a lot of people could. Neither of them voluntarily did.

Daniel was 17, Jason was 18. Jean had been the baby of the three, and neither of them could swallow it, how the one who had lived the least had somehow been stripped of them all. The one who was the youngest and weakest, and yet with the loudest voice, had been spending his last hours somewhere unknown to the two of them, most likely trembling and weeping, helpless and small and so unlike his normal self.

Their minds wandered in different directions in this often questioned aspect of life: the final hours, the big finish, and in their own personal thoughts, there was a special place reserved for their brother, and they wondered what it was like for Jean.

As their roles in the family were different, so were the varied stories played out in their heads.

How Jason, the oldest and the protector, had wished so desperately that it was him and not Jean. He would have fought tooth and nail to escape. He knew that Jean did, but his hard-as-he-could must not have been hard enough, not nearly.

He looked the most like Jean, except larger, more muscular, and every time he bathed, he turned the lights off so that he did not have to notice these similarities and differences in the mirror above the sink.

Avoiding mirrors became a part of the daily routine. Brush your teeth, don't look. Comb your hair, don't look. Get dressed, just trust your mother's kind words, don't look. Don't look, don't look, don't look.

Daniel was a whole different story. He did not think of how that day should have ended. It wasn't that he didn't cry and beg and plead God the first night Jean went missing to bring him home. It wasn't that he didn't _want_ his brother to return. It was just that he knew he couldn't change things, and Jean being dead would stay that way, no matter how drastically the world shifted without his presence.

All he could think about was what Jean must have felt. Terror, grief beyond comprehension, a bone-shattering desire to come back home and embrace his mother and father, his brothers. The normalcy disguised to a child's mind as immortality, his life.

People get scared before they die, Daniel at least thought. He saw it this way: people's souls cling to the earth before departing, unwilling, reluctant. Jean would have not been his normal self if he were a dying animal. He wanted to understand, but it was hard.

Jean knew this and felt the need to tell him that he had died inside of a room built within the earth, that the last scent that had filled his nostrils was of moist dirt, that he had screamed and no one heard. He wanted to tell him everything that he did and did not want to hear. He simply wanted him to know.

But what Jean wanted to tell Daniel the most was that his theory about the fleeing of spirits after death to the afterlife was just about right.

If Jean could put in words what he had experienced in those last moments of beating, breathing life, and the small moments after, he think he may have put it like that.

It was hard to breathe. The lingering memory from only minutes before of the knife, unsheathed, the edge of the blade curving up into a mocking grin, was growing faint, dim around the edges. He felt as though he was not wholly there. He saw his world through the eyes of a dying person; the sharp pain that pulsated like a drum before, formed in the cuts and wounds that littered this broken, bleeding body of a teenaged boy, was slowly beginning to lift from his skin.

The sound of his heavy, rattling breath had frightened him. That noise, that groaning, cracking wisp of a sound was so suddenly foreign to him, and hearing himself, he felt feral somehow, inhuman. Something so different than a healthy, lively child.

Blood is finite, he thought, hope somehow finding its way into his weary brain, and all in a single moment, he wanted to find sleep. He knew he was dying, and he wanted to find peace in the thought that this would all soon be over. Was it so unnatural of him that he wished to find release?

 _Blood is finite. Time is not._ The two ideals contrasted starkly against one another, and yet belonged so. Strangely enough, the world, that had seemed to center around his life and those in it, would still spin without him.

And just like that, a light inside of him flickered off.

There was not even the slightest bit of discomfort that he felt. He didn't feel shamefully bloated anymore, he didn't feel the sudden changes of warmth and chill that bit at the bare flesh below the waist. The humiliation was still there, hot and livid, swelling within his scorching stomach, but there were no longer nerves to correspond with.

As an internal tremor began to slowly subside, the truth set in like the blade of a sword, piercing his already bleeding heart.

 _This,_ he thought wearily, _is it._

And he began to feel once again, but it was as if his flesh was burning, sensitive and hyper aware of every gentle touch his body could allow. The sensation of being alone multiplied and grew a million times stronger than he had ever experienced before. The light that had flickered faintly inside of him and then died not long before suddenly grew hot, glowing intensely, filling with him an almost unbearable warmth.

He began to leave himself. A glimpse of his mortality as he rushed out made him never want to see again.

After witnessing the small miracle of others ascending, drifting away to heaven from his own dreamy perpetual home, he recounted the memory of his own experience with a sort of vividness that was inexplicable.

He had left himself there, his freshly bleeding corpse there alone with the one who had inflicted it all to begin with, and he wondered, as his being seemingly rose upwards, into the outside world, if his murderer knew he wasn't there anymore. That he was touching a body that wouldn't feel, talking to a mere object that wouldn't reply, looking with such an intensity at something that would never see again.

Escaping, wandering, trying to get away consumed him entirely, like flames licking away at the very core of his being, yet he felt hesitant to wholly depart. It was almost as if he was disintegrating, fragments of himself slipping through his fingers, as he feebly attempted to stay grounded to the soil, to the world that he was so accustomed to living in. His grasp on earth was slackening, and although he wanted to get away, get away, get away from the room made within the ground, he hadn’t wanted to like this.

And all in a moment, he had no choice but to let go.

As Jean recalled the lucid memory more and more often, he couldn’t help himself but to always think of his brother.

If there was anything he wanted to say to Daniel the most it would be this, grudgingly so: _You were right._

Departing souls cling to the earth like scared children to their mothers, desperately hanging onto anything, everything that could keep them grounded. But, inevitably, they are plucked from the ground by God and ascend effortlessly.

In heaven, Jean loved to watch spirits hover in the air, traveling slowly to their own eternities that rested far beyond. Caught in the light, they looked like mere floating dust particles.

How they were so much more than that, and how he had once been one of them, he would never fully be able to understand, and yet how it filled him with a warmth that soaked to the core.


	2. Chapter 2

When Jean was younger, he always thought of heaven like it was often told: floating on clouds, clusters of angels sitting here and there, the entire world around you painted in a pristine white, beams of light shining in every crack and crevice. Not an inch of darkness.

Spotless. Flawless in every single way.

There was something dreamy, almost eerie about the thought: a place where there were no barriers between the easily obtained and inconceivable, where there were no imperfections. He found that a place you had to die for to enter had to be something special, just not special enough that he would be willing to die for it alone.

There was always an unwavering wariness that had settled in his chest, soaked to his bones as a small child that made him most afraid to die. Never had he felt sure about the afterlife, and so he wondered from the moment his small self could handle such a grave question: _Where will I go when I die?_ And this uneasiness never quite left even after he did.

Since his soul had left earth, he knew that there was a reason that his belly churned with slight anxiety, mixed with all the excitement of a simple wish come true when he found just how otherworldly this place was.

He was not used to this home that went beyond the limits of worldly matter.

Life was what he loved. Normality found in everyday occurrences made him feel invincible almost, much more so than when he was already dead; a heaven that gave him everything he could have ever wanted felt almost tedious when he actually _wanted_ and _received_ , the latter being not something that happened often on earth. It was like finally discovering that the regular order of his life could somehow be broken, shattered. The reason he could get anything, everything he wanted now, was only that he had died, that he had gained the ultimate loss of his humanity.

What made him feel the most invulnerable, almost achingly so, was being alive, and there was nothing that could change that, nothing that could take it all back.

In heaven, he could be safe forever. But there was nothing there that could exactly offer what his own beating heart used to; a sense of fleeting strength found in the small fact that he was alive, he was a normal child that went to school like all the other normal children, who was imperfect in ways that only his youth could offer, who didn't die.

But Jean soon found that this wasn't exactly true. All of the thoughts of the future that he leaned so heavily against, depended on, were thrown out the window, along with the trust he had grounded in whatever higher power there was.

_You let me live long enough that I thought this would never happen._ But Jean wasn't blameless, and he knew that. His fault was that he had lost his grasp on reality and forgot how fragile human life was.

Jean, in fact, was not what the majority would call a normal child, and the false security he had wrapped himself in when he was still alive, that anyone could grow ripe and old, was buried underneath the earth with him.

***

Marco was a boy that Jean met five days after arriving in heaven. He was the same age as him, that same perpetual 15 years, and the reason that he was there was unknown; Jean didn't want to ask. Not yet, anyway.

Jean had seated himself on a bench by a park nearby, gaze lingering on the empty swings, the vacant basketball court close by. He had seen other people in his heaven since he had arrived, but not very often, and he was constantly having to fight off quiet loneliness. So far he had felt nothing but isolated, and he hated it.

That was when he came, strolled by nonchalantly, and simply sat himself next to Jean, only a few inches away. The bench creaked with the sudden addition of weight, and only then did Jean realize he wasn't all by himself anymore, at least, not at the moment.

"Hey," Marco said, and the corners of his lips lifted in a warm smile.

Jean sat silent for a moment or two, eyes glancing left and right-- _Are you talking to_ me _?_ \--before gazing at the ground, cheeks slightly tinted pink in embarrassment, fists clenching anxiously in his lap. “Um...hi,” he said slowly. Marco was open and affable right off the bat; Jean was graceless and awkward.

Marco’s smile instantly grew wider, hearing the boy’s voice, and he asked, “How long have you been here?”

“Five,” Jean replied, tense posture relaxing. “Five days.”

“I’ve been here for a year,” Marco said easily.

And so it began.

***

Marco, Jean had learned, loved to play basketball, so in their heaven, there was never a cracked blacktop too far away, yelling girls and boys crowding the court and either watching or playing themselves. Jean never played. Nonetheless, he enjoyed watching Marco, and that was enough.

Marco wasn’t exactly interested in sketching or painting, but just the same, he always watched Jean scrabble hurriedly across a sheet of paper, a page in a sketchbook, whatever Jean could find. He watched intently with curious eyes, and the boy’s skill never failed to amaze him.

Many of their interests intertwined. Jean thought that was why they met so quickly, and he was grateful; he needed someone to find comfort in, to share his thoughts. He only wanted to find a friend.

They spoke of memories of their lives, sought to find solace in these small fragments of time that didn’t quite exist anymore, but whose worth was beyond what words could explain.

They spoke like any kid of their age would; of crushes, could-have-beens, weres.

And that was when Eren Jaeger came, waltzing his way into the conversation, much too easily as the words rolled off of Jean's tongue like water running from a faucet. Naturally infuriating, as always.

"I think he liked me," Jean whispered.

Marco drank from a mug of hot chocolate, eyes peering over the lid of the cup excitedly at the mere mention of those could-have-beens, and he set it down quickly.

That was one of the things about heaven Jean liked the most, no restrictions that hampered with small pleasures. If you were living a world surrounded by the blinding white of snow, you could still eat ice cream and not feel colder. As warm as it was then, you could still enjoy hot chocolate. Silly things that didn't matter but still weren't exactly right on earth weren't questioned here. It was all about what you wanted.

"Why do you say that?" Marco chuckled, and straightened his back, as if preparing himself for a story.

Jean shrugged and made a noncommittal noise in his throat. "I mean...we kissed once? A few days before I died and--"

Marco gaped. "You _kissed_?"

Jean nodded.

He laughed loudly and raked a hand through his hair. "Well, then he _obviously_ liked you, Jean! Why do you sound like you're not sure?"

Jean shrunk. "I don't know, I mean--ever since I met him we didn't really like each other but at the same time...we did? I don't know..." He himself was having a hard time working his brain around the matter.

Marco stared at him for moments on end, still smiling, like he always did, before asking, "Do you wanna tell me what happened before...?"

"Uhm. We were both late for first period and getting into our lockers in the hallway," Jean muttered, "and then we started talking and somehow it turned into flirting. And it just...happened."

"Ooh," Marco said, "so you guys had like liked each other for a while then?"

"That's what I think."

Jean would later explain in actual detail how he had kissed Eren Jaeger, the things they had done together before that, the things that they had together. And other things were kept private.

But for then, at that moment, a girl not too far away asked Marco and Jean to join them in a game, and they complied, leaving Marco's empty mug behind, the sticky inside soon attracting ants to gather.


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> not really a shippy chapter; jean's brother daniel, whose character was less explored in the first chapter, is mourning.

Daniel never strayed far from the others in school, and yet he distanced himself from the guidance councilors, teachers and parents of classmates who were so suddenly and intently crowding on him. It wasn't that he didn't enjoy their presence on a usual day, but that was just it. Days weren't exactly what he would call normal anymore. He didn't know if they could ever be again.

There was something strange and tragic that bubbled in his gut whenever the thought that his little brother had, in the worst possible way, ran ahead of him, came to mind. It was an otherworldly thing, a feeling that he'd never imagined he would be forced to endure in his entire life.

And the people who surrounded him everyday suddenly clung to that precious, hated and reserved feeling of his; it seemed as though they fed on it, constantly staring when they noticed he was dazing off in class, constantly asking how he was when they had never been interested before, constantly closing in on him and making him patronized.

Daniel knew he shouldn't be harboring these feelings either, ones that grated on his nerves and caused him to think that every single word of condolence was one of actual pity. And he absolutely hated pity.

Even his friends from the football team, playful jocks that always glowed with a sense of overwhelming confidence, shrunk in on themselves when they were around Daniel.

It was all because someone had decided to hurt a child. It was all because someone out there, unseen to the searching eye, was sitting pretty after touching someone's baby, someone's little brother, someone's friend, someone's reason for feeling happiness, love.

Jean was all of these things at once and more. These traits and others were what made him who he was, and yet now, he was nothing more than a horror story, a warning sent to children around the neighborhood, a creeping fear that caused parents to keep their sons and daughters inside when the sun began to drop below the horizon.

Daniel doesn't think he'll ever see an ad for a missing child the same again. He realizes now all the sorts of terror hiding behind a faded photo of some kid's face with words subtly begging for help printed underneath: _Have you seen this child?_

And at what cost did he gain this unbearable way to see terrible things for what they truly were?

He enters his house after another day at school, set on repeat, more worried glances and quiet whispers. He sees his mother and father, just the same as this past week and a half since a child of theirs suddenly vanished without any other traces other than blood discovered in the earth and a pair of gloves that belonged to him. Dead looks on their faces, their voices changed, the sounds of their laughter absent.

And Daniel walks past them, mumbling a quiet greeting and being returned a greeting as equally quiet, up the stairs, past Jason's room, the closed door of his room that sealed him inside for hours on end now, and finally in front of his own.

And he pauses as his fingertips fall onto the knob, eyes gazing from the corner of his eyes at the untouched room opposite of his. He stays like that for moments on end, frozen, until he heaves in a deep breath, grits his teeth, and slowly turns.

He's suddenly facing the closed door of Jean's room, his "oh-so-great sanctuary" as he liked to call it, and for what, because Mama had bought him a lava lamp for his birthday that soaked the walls, the bed and every piece of furniture in burning, changing colors? It never really impressed Daniel too much, but Jean thought it looked cool and that was what was important.

Daniel enters the room achingly slow, and listens to the familiar sound of the door creaking as it opens.

Jean's bed was still unmade from the morning of his disappearance. A pair of pants, a couple of t-shirts were scattered on the floor carelessly. The calendar was marked up with Xs all the way to 14th of December. The empty space made for the 15th was blank, untouched, and so was the rest of 1976. That one day, the 15th of December, seemed to end everything all at once, unfairly, much too soon. Jean had planned on filling the stupid thing with Xs until the year ended and he bought a new one.

It was suddenly as if Daniel was entering a place completely off-limits. A precious sanctuary in a museum filled with relics untouched since the day of a historic event, and he was almost hesitant as he slowly seated himself on Jean's bed.

It began as a small peep, spilling from his lips quietly as his fingers grasped tight onto a brightly-colored pillow. And as he drew it slowly to his chest, his aching chest that was too suddenly bursting with horrible feelings he didn't think he should have had to feel, his vision became blurred and his eyes began to fill with tears quick, the tears beginning to roll down his cheeks smoothly.

And Jean watched his oldest brother cry from heaven, quiet sobs bubbling forth, unable to be helped, this sadness that could not possibly be smothered by anything other than the face of a missing family member returning.

And he thinks about how Jean could be watching at that very moment. He thinks about the very image of this moment in time, an image that could find itself into a tradgedy film: His 18-year-old sibling burying himself in Jean's old belongings, crying, so vulnerable that it crossed the line. It tarnished the unsaid rule of keeping your younger siblings from ever witnessing you upset, as to make sure that your weakness did not set off a chain reaction of even more distress.

Jean only watched because he couldn't touch, he couldn't offer words of comfort. He could only see. The living and dead were alien to one another, unable to really connect again until they were the same yet again. And so Jean was, all at once, an alien to Daniel, otherworldly, untouchable.

As he watched silently, crying himself, Jean could only think of one simple sentence, an understatement, really, to sum up his experiences as one of the dead so far:

_This sucks._


End file.
